The Calgary Flames are coming off a white-knuckled 4-3 win over the lowly Colorado Avalanche on Wednesday night and they continue their trek to the trade deadline with a meeting tonight with the Columbus Blue Jackets. Game time is 7pm on Sportsnet West and Sportsnet 960 The Fan.

The Flames (13-15-4) are recovering from a tumultuous 48 hours, one which saw their captain depart for Pennsylvania and the team pick up a big divisional win, part of their effort to try to salvage some positives from this up-and-down season. The Jackets (13-14-7) have been excellent lately, boasting a 5-2-3 record over their last ten games, but are fresh from a road loss last night in Edmonton. The Jackets have an awful, awful road record, while the Flames have won eight in a row on Saddledome ice.

Can the Flames start the post-Iginla era with a win and stretch out their impressive home winning streak? Can they continue to feast upon teams playing their second of back-to-back road games? Or will they struggle against the Jackets once again?

THE LINE-UP

Forgotten in the last few days of craziness is the fact that the Flames have found ways to win at home. The team has won eight straight at the Dome, even when playing back-to-back games, or playing good teams, or starting their back-up goalie, or missing their franchise player (etc.).

I would expect Calgary to dress a similar line-up as in Wednesday's game, albeit with some minor tweaks. Here's how the lines finished off against Colorado:

Glencross-Stajan-Stempniak

Comeau-Cammalleri-Tanguay

Cervenka-Backlund-Hudler

McGrattan-Begin-Jackman

Brodie-Bouwmeester

Giordano-Wideman

Butler-Sarich

MacDonald

I would probably expect to see Miikka Kiprusoff in net, and perhaps Derek Smith to rotate back into the line-up on the blueline. Alex Tanguay didn't skate on Thursday and briefly left Wednesday's game before returning. My guess is he'll play.

With Iginla gone forever and ever (or until he returns), the Flames are down to 12 forwards, so I would expect them to summon a body from Abbotsford in the near futrure. The Heat play in Hamilton tonight and Toronto on Saturday, so if somebody's coming, they'll either come immediately or after the weekend.

THE OPPOSITION

Despite the fact that the Blue Jackets have historically been just awful, the Flames have nevertheless struggled against them. Last season the Calgary went 1-2-1 against the Jackets and they've split their pair of games this year, although Columbus has managed to get points in every single game over that span.

The upside for Calgary is that Columbus played last night in Edmonton – and lost by a score of 6-4. There's a chance that instead of facing goalie extraordinaire Sergei Bobrovsky, they may get back-up sieve extraordinaire Steve Mason.

Here's how the lines looked for the Jackets last night, when they scratched Nick Foligno due to injury and rolled with seven defensemen, including pariah Tim Erixon.

Brassard-Letestu-Prospal

Calvert-Anisimov-Atkinson

Umberger-Johansen-Collins

rotating-MacKenzie-Boll

Wisniewski-Tyutin

Nikitin-Prout

Johnson-Aucoin

Erixon

Mason

I wouldn't expect Foligno back tonight, but maybe Colton Gillies or John Moore could jump in on the fourth line in lieu of Erixon. Then again, with Jarome Iginla gone forever (or until he returns), Flames fans could bond in their hatred of Erixon.

SUM IT UP

Columbus played last night and lost, while the Flames are 7-2-1 playing a team that played the night before. Better yet, the Flames rebounded from a one-sided game in Chicago by beating Colorado – albeit a Colorado team that's dreaming of Seth Jones right now.

The Jarome Iginla era is over. Whatever the next era will end up being, it begins tonight, rather inauspiciously, with a game against the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Ryan Pike has covered the Calgary Flames since 2010. A Calgary native who writes for FlamesNation and The Hockey Writers, he's often at Flames games and practices, as well as spotted in the background of scrums and press conferences asking about Sven Baertschi.

I would settle for the first and third scenario. The Flames schedule is about to get much tougher and with a couple more trades, we should be right in the mix for last. Then, please see us draft in the top 3.

"While the top pick can now go to any of the 14 non-playoff clubs, or the team owning the rights to the first pick of a non-playoff club, the odds of winning the lottery are unchanged from previous years. The teams in the drawing are ranked in inverse order of their regular season point totals, with team one being the club with the fewest points, and team 14 being the club with the most points among those outside of the playoffs."

The 2013 NHL Draft Lottery, to be held this year on Monday, April 29, will be the first in NHL history where all 14 clubs not qualifying for the Stanley Cup Playoffs, or the clubs that have acquired the first-round drafting positions of those non-playoff clubs, will have a chance at winning the right to the first overall selection. Under the previous lottery system, only the five teams with the fewest points in the standings had the opportunity to win the first overall selection as rules dictated no team could move up more than four spots.

Flames had a terrible time managing the puck in the neutral zone tonight. Again, the netminding was meh, but jesus stop giving the puck to the other team while your guys are moving the wrong direction.

After tonight there will be many more tough nights ahead for the Flames. Before I can make a decision on whether or not this team is heading in the right direction I am going to reserve my judgement until the draft.

With Bouwmeester hopefully on the move I hope the Flames can aquire more picks and prospects in this deep draft. There are players in this draft who can kick start the rebuilding or retooling.

While I don't like the team losing, this type of season has been long overdue.
Finally the ownership and management has come to the realization that this team is no longer good enough to compete and that the majority of the players on this team will never move this team towards a playoff birth.